Caged Heart
by agentwhalesong
Summary: Mulder and Scully try to solve some mysterious murders in a small town while Scully struggles with her feelings for her partner. Scully's POV. I'm calling it a mini case fic with unresolved sexual tension. I suck at summaries. Also, this is my first time writing something like this, so please don't be too harsh on me, okay? P
1. Things Do Get Worse

_That cold ain't the weather; that's death approaching_

\- 30 days of night

BAYHOLM FIELDS

3:35 P.M.

She is freezing cold, so she starts walking faster in hopes her body heat will increase. Well, she tries to walk faster because her feet sink into the snow and just the effort and time it takes to get one foot out and then the other scares the hell out of her. It shouldn't be this foggy, there shouldn't be this much snow. She can't see a single thing in front of her and she realizes she could be literally anywhere right now. Her sense of direction is good, but she usually has her vision to help her out. Now all she can see is a multitude of white. She shouldn't have left in such a hurry, she wasn't thinking, but facing a snowstorm seemed preferable than stay and face the fact that her lifelong boyfriend was fucking someone else in her own living room.

She hugs herself in an attempt to feel warmer. The wind feels colder, and the snow seems to be falling heavier than it was just a second ago. She has never regretted all her life choices as much as she does now. She has to reach her mom's before it gets really bad. Not that anything could get any worse, now that she thinks of it.

Or maybe she is wrong.

The first thing she feels is the chill down her spine, a chill that comes with the feeling that she is not alone. There is someone watching her, she is sure.

"Where the fuck is mom's house?" She says quietly. She doesn't know why she said it aloud. Maybe in hopes that whoever is watching knows that she is expected somewhere and will leave her alone.

The sound of her own voice gives her confidence to keep on walking.

 _That's it, Sally, keep going. Just five more minutes and you're there._

She knows she is lying to herself because it is a five-minute walk on a regular-weather day. With this much snow, it will take her at least three times that.

She remembers now that no one in the news said anything about a snowstorm today. How is it possible that she has suddenly found herself in the middle of one?

 _You can't even trust the weather forecast anymore._

She curses aloud but what she really wants to do is cry.

She shouldn't panic, she knows it, but her mind is already focusing on the chills down her spine again, chills that only seem to grow by the second. She remembers the coping mechanisms she used to hold on to when she was just a kid and everything seemed too much for her to handle. She would start concentrating on her own sounds, on her heart beating, on her breath, on the sound of her own footsteps, until she calmed down. She thinks it is a good idea to start doing that just now, so she starts paying attention to her every sound, especially the sound of her feet propelling her forward, making sure everything is alright.

It is then that she realizes there is another sound of feet sinking into the snow, and this sound seems to be a little louder than what her 100-pound figure would make. This sound is coming from right behind her.

She tries to think fast, tries to find a solution. The only one she can find she is absolutely sure is useless, but she tries anyway.

She starts to run.

In the beginning it actually works, and for five seconds she thinks she is going to escape. She doesn't dare turn around, but she feels that whoever is after her has started running too.

She has a moment of clarity where she considers the obvious: it is John. He probably came after her to apologize. Not that she will accept any apologies but thinking it's her ex-boyfriend behind her is better than thinking it's someone trying to kill her or worse. Yes, there are worse things than being killed.

"John, is that you?"

She asks, her voice shaking with fear.

There is no answer.

She tries to run faster, but she instantly feels her left foot twist and the next thing she knows, she's falling hard onto the snow.

It is then that the feet behind her catch up. She sees the blood before she feels the pain and then… and then nothing.


	2. Nowhere

Scully takes the file in her hands once again and reads it for the 100th time. Sally Anderson, 28, found dead and without her left arm right in front of her mother's house. Last person to see the victim alive: her lifelong partner, John Davis.

She doesn't really know why she read the info again since she knows everything by heart by now. She knows that the file states that Sally was the fourth victim in a serial killing that has only presented four clues so far:

each victim was found with a missing limb;

all victims have been women, but there doesn't seem to be any pattern.

all victims died during an unexplainable snowstorm, which also caused an unexplainably thick fog;

the killer seemed to be heading north, leaving Mulder and Scully right at the center of where they think he (or she) will strike next.

She replays all four clues in her head, trying to see if something clicks.

Nowhere. They are literally in the middle of nowhere in every way.

She sighs again, looking at all the files and autopsy reports laid out on the bed where she is sitting with her legs crossed, every single piece of them trying to tell her a story she isn't seeing, or perhaps that she doesn't want to see.

Bloody footprints in the snow, several women dead, several missing limbs.

 _Bloody non-human footprints_ , she corrects herself in her head. _Bloody non-animal footprints_ , she adds. There is nothing in known science that could fit the size and the shape of the footprints found in the snow. Not to mention that said footprints came to a halt at some point, leaving no tracks of where the killer might have gone after satisfying his or her need to kill and rip people apart. Maybe they are aliens' footprints and Mulder has surprisingly not come up with that theory just yet. She chuckles thinking that, at this point, even aliens might be a plausible explanation. Maybe she's really been spending too much time with Mulder.

"Find anything?"

She shakes her head while looking again at all the pictures and stories laid out in front of her.

"Nope."

She raises her head to look at him and observes as he plays with his bottom lip between his fingers absentmindedly as he looks at her. He really should stop doing that; she should really find a way of preventing her eyes from following his fingers every time.

She tries hard not to think about it, but she can still remember the smoothness of his bottom lip under her thumb, the desire she saw in his eyes when she let her mind get carried away and her hands just followed its lead. It happened a couple of weeks ago, but sometimes she catches herself thinking about it a lot more than she should.

She clears her throat to try and compose herself and she observes as he straightens up on his chair, as if she has awakened him from his own daydreaming as well.

Mulder stands up and walks to the small radio beside the bed, turning it on for the 400th time as if in hopes that this time it will work. But as the other 399 times, the only thing they can hear is static, much like the static they hear every time they try to make a call. He sighs in frustration.

"I wish we at least knew how long this snowstorm is going to be around."

She nods in agreement.

"When you said we had to share a cabin in the middle of nowhere, this was certainly NOT what I was expecting."

She jokes, but she can't help sighing too. She closes her eyes and rolls her neck around to try and dissolve the tension – both the tension of the day and the one she felt building up due to the implications of her last statement. Thankfully, his reply is just a suspicious, sly smirk.

"Do you think we will survive the night without a fire?"

He points to the small fireplace on the opposite side of the room, watching as the remaining flames disappear in front of their eyes.

"Hopefully…"

One almost-frozen-to-death experience in Antarctica was enough for a lifetime, she doesn't need any other free samples of how it feels to die of hypothermia.

He sits by her side on the bed and she can almost hear the gears turning inside his head, trying to make sense of whatever it is that is happening in this off-the-beaten-track place. They have been doing this all day, taking turns in looking at all the evidence they have, narrating the case to each other to see if something they missed would come up suddenly, but it is now the middle of the night and still no luck. The only thing they can really do is wait and hope that the killer is deeply asleep somewhere and not out in the snow looking for his next victim. So far, all victims have been killed during daylight, so maybe they still have a chance. What worries her more is the sudden snowstorm that wasn't supposed to exist, but somehow it does. Maybe the killer is changing his pattern and is now willing to kill during the night as well. She can only hope she is wrong.

Mulder sighs again and, by the way he runs his hands through his hair, she knows he is frustrated with yet another thing that he can't control.

"Maybe we should just put everything away and try to get some sleep. We're no good if we can't think straight." He closes his eyes and then shakes his head, leaving his hair disheveled as he runs his hand through it one last time. "Besides, we can't leave this place anyway so… Maybe all this will make sense during our sleep and we will wake up knowing exactly who to arrest and where."

She chuckles at the thought that it could REALLY be like that for a change. Why can't things be easy for them every once in a while?

She uncrosses her legs and hops out of the bed, starting to gather all the photos and files and wishing they could magically rearrange themselves in an order that would give them all the answers they need. Magic. Have they considered magic?

She giggles at her own thoughts and realizes she has been working too hard. Her brain is already suggesting things she doesn't even believe in.

She picks up the last piece of evidence from the bed and looks at Mulder again, realizing he is smiling back at her.

"Sometimes I wish I could still read minds, Scully, especially when you laugh for apparently no reason."

 _Oh, Mulder, I'm glad you can't._

She sometimes wonders if he peeked inside her mind when he was in the hospital and what he thought of what he saw. She wishes she were brave enough to ask. Maybe one day she will. Right now, she just settles for a simple reply.

"Now you know how I feel when you create theories in your head and don't share them with the class."

He chuckles softly and doesn't look away. She wishes he wouldn't do that because she can't look away either. She has to do or say something before it gets too much to bear.

"I call dibs on the bed."

This seems to get him out of his trance. He struggles with his words for no more than two seconds before replying.

"Damn, Scully! Why are you always faster when it comes to the good stuff, huh?"

 _Not all the good stuff, Mulder. Not all of them._

She just smirks at him instead of saying those words and, again, she's glad she can keep all her thoughts to herself.

He stands up and goes to the bathroom while she changes into her pajamas.

When she climbs back into bed, she hears his voice.

"Are you dressed? Can I come out?"

She smiles before she answers that yes, he can come out. It's not like they haven't seen each other naked before, but she likes it that he tries to respect her privacy when there is an option.

He walks back into the room, gives her a quick, tired smile and then crawls into a sleeping bag on the floor. She feels kind of selfish that she gets the big bed while he has to sleep on the floor, but she also knows that there are cases where she is the one sleeping on the floor when they have no choice but sleep in the same room. They have a good partnership, after all.

She waits until he gets into his sleeping bag and gets comfortable in there to turn off the lights.

"Good night, Mulder."

"Good night, Scully."

She pulls the comforter up to her neck and realizes the temperature has dropped even more, so much so the comforter will probably not warm her for longer.

She thinks about the case, about the snowstorm, about unknown bloody footprints in the snow, about people dying mysteriously and how they were not fast enough to prevent the killing of the last victim. She also thinks of how cold she is feeling. Obviously, her thoughts make it extremely hard for her to sleep, even though she can feel the exhaustion of the day in her bones. She turns in bed to try a more comfortable position and sees Mulder on the floor, his sleeping bag moving in ways it shouldn't. It takes her a while to realize that he is trying to get warm and that the moving the sleeping bag is doing is due to his body shaking.

"Mulder?"

"Yes?" He says, his voice shaking a little too.

"Why don't you come sleep with me?" She only realizes what she has said when she hears Mulder chuckle. She admonishes herself for not choosing her words more carefully and she feels like telling herself to shut up forever, but Mulder is giggling and already on his way to bed, so she tells him to shut up instead.

"I'm not saying anything, Scully, I'm familiar with Freudian slips."

"It's not…" She starts, but she knows any explanations would only make things worse, so she doesn't finish her sentence.

She moves to the side and watches as he slides in easily beside her, as if this is something they do every day.

 _It would feel good to do this every day..._

She pushes her thoughts away before they can go any further because, once again, she is having ideas she shouldn't.

She closes her eyes and hears him settle beside her.

"Hey, Scully, you know what's funny?"

"What, Mulder?"

She tries to sound annoyed rather than amused, but she isn't sure she is successful.

"We are compatible even in bed."

 _Excuse me?_

"What do you mean?" She asks instead, a little too suspicious of where this is headed.

"You always sleep on the right, I always sleep on the left."

She chuckles in spite of herself.

"One less thing to fight about, I guess."

They stay in silence for a few moments and she thinks he's fallen asleep, but then she hears his voice again.

"Do you think we would fight a lot if we were a couple?" She hears him turning on his side to look at her and she has to fight back the urge of doing the same.

She tries to pretend she's already falling asleep.

"Does it even matter?"

Her answer is her way of trying not to think of the implications in his words, that he thinks about the same things she does sometimes.

"I guess not..." he says in a low voice, sounding too disappointed for her not to notice.

She tries to focus on sleep again, but her brain immediately feeds her with images of people with severed limbs and bloody non-human footprints in the snow. And she is suddenly very cold again.

It takes just a few seconds for her to decide.

She scoots closer to him, feeling his body heat reassure her of her decision immediately.

His eyes jolt open in surprise as she wraps one arm around his waist.

"Scully...?"

He is certainly confused by her action, she can see it in his eyes, but she can also see amusement in them. She finds it funny that confusing each other seems to be their favorite hobby.

"I'm cold. Body heat. You know how it goes."

She closes her eyes again as she takes a deep breath, pretending not to feel anything when the smell of him enters her nostrils and then takes over her lungs.

She can feel him relax against her and one of his arms carefully wraps around her waist too. She could certainly get used to this.

"I thought body heat only worked when two people were naked inside a sleeping bag." He whispers.

She chuckles.

"It's still not raining sleeping bags, Mulder."

"And that, for me, is just more proof that god doesn't exist."

She just smiles because although part of her wants to continue this conversation, another part of her doesn't want to push her luck. Sometimes she wonders why they keep shutting each other out when they clearly want the same thing. Maybe she's the one shutting him out.

She pushes her head into the crook of his neck almost unconsciously, finding it simultaneously funny and amazing that every piece of his body seems to fit perfectly well against hers, even with their height difference.

She hears Mulder sigh and tries not to think about the goosebumps she suddenly feels on his skin under her fingers. She didn't realize when she did it, but her hand is now under his shirt, respectfully resting on his side. If he asks, she'll just say it is for body-heat purposes. But he doesn't ask and she is glad.

Before she knows it, she's deep asleep, pushing all the conflicting thoughts to the back of her mind.


	3. Seeing Is Believing

Something jolts her awake and her heart is doing flip flops inside her chest when she opens her eyes. She doesn't know if it is because of whatever it was that woke her up or if it is due to the sight in front of her, due to how comfortable his hands feel on her side.

He opens his eyes just a few seconds after, an innocent smile showing up, giving her no time or chance to look away. She smiles back sheepishly, allowing him into her thoughts for just a couple of seconds. She looks down at his bottom lip and licks her own – a common and involuntary reaction she should really learn how to control. With her peripheral vision, she sees that his Adam's apple suddenly bobs up and down. She doesn't want to look him in the eye because she knows he caught her staring, and she doesn't know if she'll have enough willpower to just not do or say anything about it.

Mornings tend to do this to her, leave her more open to the possibilities just the night before she considered too out of her reach. Mornings make her do stupid things she doesn't know if she is prepared for.

She feels his hand move slowly up her side and she doesn't know if his movement is conscious or not. She feels warmth flooding into her heart and into her center. If things _were_ to happen, it shouldn't be like this, and yet…

She is already considering raising her eyes to meet his gaze again when she hears a sound, one that she is now sure was the reason why she woke up with her heart ready to jump out of her chest: a very loud and very human scream.

They both stand up at once, grabbing and putting on their coats as they make their way to the door. There is no time to change if they want to save whoever screamed that way. She hopes her unpartnerly thoughts didn't contribute for it being too late already.

They step out in the freezing cold morning, fully alert, their eyes looking for any signs of what might be happening. The snowstorm seems to be gone now, but it's still too foggy to see anything. Scully looks around as she walks and almost wishes to hear another scream so she can follow it. A scream is good, she thinks. A scream means there is still time.

"See anything?"

She asks Mulder, but Mulder doesn't answer. She turns around and realizes Mulder is not there anymore. And nor is their cabin, for that matter. She just walked a few feet, how did it suddenly vanish like that?

She pushes away the thoughts that come to her mind. It's just the power of suggestion. She read the files too many times, that's it. What happened to the victims is certainly not the same thing that is happening right now.

She doesn't want to admit it, but she is starting to panic.

"Mulder!"

She shouts.

 _He can't have gone far, he was just here!_

She hears another scream, a louder one this time. Somehow, she knows that whoever produced that scream used her last bit of strength to cry for help.

She follows the sound, feeling more and more frozen by the second. Frozen on the outside, frozen on the inside.

 _Keep moving, Dana, just keep moving._

And then she sees it.

A silhouette in the distance.

She tightens the grip on her gun as she approaches the… this is certainly not a man or a woman. No one could be that tall. She takes a few more steps, careful not to call attention to herself, while observing the creature in front of her raising its arms, as if preparing for a final blow. She has to do something before it's too late.

"Stop! FBI! I'm armed!"

This seems to stop the creature from doing whatever it was going to do, but it also…

It's turning around now, following the sound of her voice. She sees its face as clear as day and she wouldn't dare say it is just someone wearing a costume. This looks too real. Pointed, sharp teeth show up as the creature opens its mouth and starts running her way. The snow doesn't seem to be an obstacle or offer any kind of resistance. The creature is surprisingly fast coming at her.

 _Fuck!_

She shoots the first time aiming for the head. Nothing happens.

With every breath she takes she is surer this isn't going to happen the way she wants it to. She doesn't know if the chills down her spine are just the cold or the fear creeping up on her, so fast she can't even think.

She shoots a second time, aiming for where she assumes its heart is located. She shoots once again and then again, praying this will be enough. She fires the last one of her bullets.

The creature falls to its knees and then down with his face on the snow.

She hears Mulder's voice just as she realizes that, whatever it was that she shot, isn't standing up anymore.

"Scully!"

"I'm here, Mulder!"

She shouts, looking in the direction the sound of his voice is coming from and, in no time, she sees him running and panting towards her.

"What happened?"

He asks.

"There was this... I shot it."

She points to where the creature fell, but what she sees there blows her mind. It is just a man.

As confusion takes over her, she realizes one other thing: the victim is a few feet away, lying on her back, the snow around her becoming red with blood.

 _Oh god, no!_

She runs towards her and realizes that the woman is not breathing. She feels like crying. This is not supposed to end like this.

She tries the usual CPR steps and prays. Maybe it's not too late this time.

A few seconds later a smile breaks into her face as she realizes she is right. This time she wins. This time they catch the killer and save the victim.

Suddenly, there are more people around them and she doesn't know how long she has been sitting there with the woman in her arms. Apparently, their phones started working again at some point because Mulder has called for backup and the paramedics and the police are all over the place.

She stands up and lets the paramedics take over, looking around for the first time. The fog is not there anymore and there is still no creature around. Just a man with five shots across his chest and a bleeding ear, damage which was probably caused by the first bullet she fired.

But how can this be?

She saw it with her own eyes. Whatever tried to attack her wasn't human, it was…

She feels Mulder's hand on her shoulder bringing her back to reality. She sighs.

"Mulder, I don't know what happened here. I…"

He doesn't let her finish, just guides her away from the police and the others that came to gather evidence.

She only realizes she is shaking when he stops and raises her chin with his index finger.

"It's over now. You caught him. He isn't going to hurt anyone anymore."

"But Mulder, I…" It's hard to say this aloud, so she takes a deep breath before speaking. "I didn't shoot that man."

Mulder seems confused and she can see why.

"I shot a 12-foot-tall creature. And somehow that creature is actually a man. Maybe it's the lack of sleep and I'm seeing things, but…"

Mulder nods, understanding.

"You've just experienced an X-File, Scully. You should be used to that by now."

He smiles a little to make her comfortable, and she can't help smiling back, although weakly.

"Yes, Mulder, but usually you're the one seeing things, not me."

She chuckles, thinking about all the other times that she saw things but wouldn't admit it, not even to herself. She really has come a long way in the past seven years.

The sheriff comes their way and she is already rehearsing what she will say in order not to look like a lunatic. She isn't surprised that Mulder stays there with her all the way, filling in her story with some bits and pieces, like the good partner he is.

The sheriff takes his notes and then walks away, thanking them for having caught the guy and bringing back peace to their little beautiful town. Scully is glad that at least someone is at peace because she clearly isn't.

They walk back to their cabin in silence, leaving Scully to her thoughts of how she couldn't explain anything about this case. Maybe answers will start showing up now that the killer has been caught. For the first time in her life, she is eager to perform an autopsy.


	4. Done Deal

It is a little after 2 p.m. when Mulder comes into the autopsy room, where she is leaning with her back against the sink and staring at the dead body in front of her. The man indeed died due to the shots she fired and, apart from some abnormal blood results, there is really nothing unusual about him. Maybe whatever Mulder found out in his own investigation will help her clear her mind.

"Are you okay?"

He asks in a low voice, his right hand rubbing her back slightly. He has leaned against the sink too, she notices, and his presence is comforting.

She nods.

"Yeah, I'm just… confused."

"Does the creature you saw look anything like this?"

He turns to his side and takes a book in his hands, opening it to a page that has been previously marked.

She looks at the image and wonders how it is possible that her brain could have recreated an image she has never seen in her life. The creature is there, its open mouth showing its sharp pointed teeth, its feet the size and the shape of a melon each.

She nods.

"It's called the Sqatari. It is a fictional creature, created by a fantasy writer."

"Is our killer the writer?"

Mulder shakes his head and she braces herself for whatever is coming. She has a feeling she won't like the answer.

"The writer couldn't handle the failure of his book and killed himself a few years ago." He puts the book away and continues, "Now, the focus here is not the writer, Scully, but the story he wrote."

"What's so special about the story?"

"His book is about a wizard who lost the love of his life in an accident. Her body was so crushed that the only thing they were able to save was her heart. He kept her heart in a jar in his bedroom and looked at it every day as a memento, as a way of remembering her."

"Has this wizard ever heard of pictures?"

Mulder chuckles and then continues.

"One day, he realized that maybe he could bring his beloved one back to life. He hadn't even thought about it before because the magic was forbidden but, at this point, he didn't care about being banned from the wizard community or whatever they called it; he only wanted his love back."

Scully is still not sure where this is going, but this story is starting to get too creepy to her liking. He continues.

"So, he started to put his plans into motion but, for that, he would need six different people's body parts – two legs, two arms, one torso and one head. The final part he already had – his beloved one's heart. So, being a person of magic, he found a way of transforming himself into a horrible creature so that he could kill the six women he chose and take out their body parts without being recognized. He even went further than that: he manipulated the weather so that there was always fog and lots of snow when he committed the crimes. That way, no one would ever know it was him doing the killing, since only his victims were surrounded by the fog."

"All fiction and impossibilities aside, this is all remarkably similar to our case."

She says in a low voice, trying to join the pieces of the puzzle together.

Mulder nods.

"And guess who lost his wife two months ago in a horrible car crash, Scully?"

Scully is stunned for a moment, thinking of the implications of it all.

"So you're saying that our killer tried to recreate a fictional story to justify the killing of what would be six women?"

"Not exactly. I'm saying that our killer here believed he could bring his wife back to life by killing those six women. The police found her heart in a jar in his bedroom."

She chuckles softly for a moment. She should have known this was going in this direction. It is Mulder, after all, and this is still an X-File.

"Well but believing and actually being able to do that are two completely different things."

Mulder shrugs.

"Well yeah, but how do you explain the creature you saw? And how do you explain the snowstorm on an otherwise beautiful day and the fact that we were separated by such a thick fog that we lost each other?"

She sighs. The snowstorm and the fog were just a coincidence, there is no other explanation. And the creature… well, the creature was something her brain created out of her fear. Yes, that's what happened. This is what she's going to tell Mulder and what she is going to write in her report.

She is glad Mulder is giving her time to think because she still has many questions and she still has to think them over.

"So, according to the story, he needed six people, right? So far there had been four victims, five counting the one we saved. He would have killed again if we hadn't stopped him."

Mulder nods.

"If YOU hadn't stopped him, Scully. I was just suddenly caught in a fog that only dissipated when I heard you shoot the last time."

"The fog, Mulder, was just a coincidence. No one can really manipulate the weather like that."

"Oh, Holman Hardt would disagree with you on that."

He chuckles and she is glad he is trying to lighten the mood. Plus, he has a point.

"Any clues on how he chose his victims?"

Mulder shakes his head again.

"We only know that apparently he was following the same path the character in the book did and that he chose small women because his wife was small…"

There is something in his voice Scully can't quite figure out, and she waits for him to continue just because she knows he will.

"The thing is, Scully, in the book, the wizard gets lucky when he tries to kill his second to last victim – another woman is around because she heard someone screaming. She is enveloped in the fog by mistake and, although she wasn't originally in his plans, he realizes he doesn't need to keep looking, that the final pieces of his puzzle are both within his reach."

He pauses and drops his gaze to the floor. She understands why before he can finalize his thoughts.

"It could have been you, Scully. You could have been his last victim."

"But I wasn't."

Her left hand moves into his right hand as a way of reassurance that she is still here. He starts caressing her thumb with his absentmindedly as they stay in silence and lost in their own thoughts. She is the first to speak up, and she is not sure why she starts talking. Maybe it is a way to calm down all the voices in her head.

"Do you believe that he really turned into that creature because he believed he could bring his wife back to life?"

Mulder chuckles softly.

"Yes. But in case you haven't noticed, I have a tendency to believe everything."

She chuckles; he continues.

"As horrible as this may sound, I think anyone would keep themselves open to this sort of possibility if they loved someone that much."

She nods because, even though she doesn't believe all this, she agrees that love can make you blind to reality sometimes. The next question slips out of her tongue before she can stop it.

"Have you ever loved someone that intensely?"

Her eyes are still on their locked hands but, out of the corner of her eye, she can see he has turned his head to look at her. She doesn't want to meet his eye, but she does it involuntarily. He is all magnet and she is all iron.

When her eyes meet his, she feels what can only be described as pain, but not a bad kind of pain. This pain is like the butterflies in her stomach are trying to break free but are being held by this invisible barrier she created to keep them safe in there. A safety net of sorts. A cage.

"I do," he finally answers, and she feels the force of these two simple words pierce her soul.

She knows he is not talking about someone else she is unaware of. She knows that this is meant for her and only her. Just like an almost-kiss in his hallway, just like a high-on-meds I-love-you, just like a forehead-to-forehead kiss at his front door. She knows who is in the receiving end of those two words that hold a world of meaning.

She realizes she has tears puddling up inside her eyes and she doesn't know what to do with them. Or maybe she does. Deep down, she knows. But they are in a morgue and there is a dead serial killer with his insides out lying in front of them and… they can't do this now.

She realizes she is not ready for this conversation and its consequences just yet. She wonders if she will ever be. She hopes so.

She suddenly removes her hand from his and he looks away.

She can see he is disappointed, but she knows he won't push her.

"I'd better finish this up or else we'll miss our flight."

She looks away too and walks towards the autopsy table to take the instruments she left there earlier.

She thinks he is going to leave, but she doesn't feel or hear him move at all.

"I won't be long now, I just have to close him up. If you want to go back to the cabin and pack your stuff, I'll catch up with you later."

She looks over her shoulder when she finishes speaking and he is looking at her again, a small smile on his face. It takes him a few seconds to answer, but when he does…

"I'll wait for you, Scully. As long as I need to."

She just nods, tears prickling her eyes again and being masked by the small smile she throws back at him. She knows the double meaning behind his answer. She also knows that he understands her nod is her way of saying 'thank you' to both meanings of his words.

She turns her head back to her dead patient and she is suddenly curious about something.

"There's one thing you haven't explained, though, Mulder."

His answer is merely a hum, waiting for her to continue.

"How did you read that book so fast?"

He laughs now, and she feels all the tension dissipate.

"I didn't. We found the book at our killer's house and we went to the town librarian. Apparently, not many people go in there so she kind of knew the book by heart."

"I wonder if she'll keep rereading it after all this."

As Mulder chortles, she thinks of her next move. Should she?

"One last thing, Mulder."

"Yes?"

"Next time you take me somewhere snowy, it had better not involve any X-File."

She almost adds "or any work whatsoever", but she has done enough bold moves for the past couple of days.

She hears a smile in his voice when he replies quietly.

"Deal."


End file.
